An account of the author's journey into African healing, raising profound questions about the role of consciousness and spirit in healing. Gloss, app, notes, refs, b/w illus, 128pp, SOUTH AFRICA. SPEARHEAD, 0864865562

Now in paperback. Looking at recent public health crises in the former Soviet Republics, India and the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the author draws conclusions about the state of public health across the world and the vulnerability of populations to large scale epidemics. Index, notes, xi, 477pp, UK. OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS.

In southeast Africa, the power to heal is often associated with crossing borders, whether literal or metaphorical. This wide-ranging volume reveals that healers, whose power depends on the ability to broker therapeutic resources, also contribute to the construction of the borders they transgress. While addressing diverse healing practices such as herbalism, razor-blade vaccination, spirit possession, prophetic healing, missionary health clinics, and traumatic storytelling, the nine essays in this volume explore the creativity and resilience of the region's healers and those they heal in a world shaped by economic stagnation, declining state commitments to health care, and the AIDS pandemic. Illus, 248pp, USA. INDIANA UNIVERSITY PRESS.

Newly reprinted. Traces the history of the encounter between European medicine and African societies in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. The author looks in particular at the medical discourse of the period and its links with the creation of the colonial subject. Includes chapters on the history of psychiatry in Africa and the treatment of venereal disease. Index, bib, notes, b/w illus, xii, 224pp, UK. BLACKWELL PUBLISHING.

Examines the practice of military medicine during the conquest of Africa, especially during the crucial 1880s and 1890s. Index, bib, app, xii, 256pp, UK. CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS, 0521598354

Africa's healthcare crises is well documented, even if not always accurately. What is undeniable is that millions of Africans are dying - from HIV/AIDs, tuberculosis, malaria and other illnesses - some of them easily preventable. Dr Akukwe examines the healthcare policies on Africa's major diseases - HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria, showing how the healthcare crisis is bound up with, and worsens the general crisis of poverty in the continent. He also discusses how a different form of policy intervention can make all the difference. 180pp, UK. ADONIS & ABBEY PUBLISHERS LTD.

A study analysing globalisation, development and G8 policies related to Africa. The authors focus primarily on the policies influencing health and the privatisation of health care examining how development commitments are made and broken and how global forces are affecting the health of nations. Index, app, refs, notes, tables, 378pp, SOUTH AFRICA. UNIVERSITY OF CAPE TOWN PRESS, 1919713840

Sleeping sickness, also known as Human African trypanosomiasis, is one of Africa's major killers. It puts 60 million people at risk of infection, occurs in 36 countries in sub-Saharan Africa, and claims the lives of many thousands of people every year. Transmitted by the tsetse fly, trypanosomiasis affects both humans and cattle. The animal form of the disease severely limits livestock production and farming, and in people the toxic effects of the treatment for the brain disease can be as painful and dangerous as the disease itself. Existing in the shadow of malaria and AIDS, it is an overlooked disease, ignored by pharmaceutical companies and largely neglected by the western world. Peter Kennedy has devoted much of his working life to researching sleeping sickness in Africa, and his autobiographical account shares not only his trials and experiences, evoking our empathy with the affected patients, but an explanation of the disease, including its history and its future. 304pp, UK. LUATH PRESS.

This collection of articles on Asia and Africa uses the extensive archives that exist on medical missions to both enrich and challenge existing histories of the clinic in colonial territories whether of the dispensary, the hospital, the maternity home or leprosy asylum. Selected contents: Linda Beer KUMWENDA: African Medical Personnel of the Universities Mission to Central Africa in Northern Rhodesia; Michael JENNINGS: A Matter of Vital Importance: The Place of the Medical Mission in Maternal and Child Healthcare in Tanganyika, 191939; Uoldelul Chelati DIRAR: Curing Bodies to Rescue Souls: Health in Capuchins Missionary Strategy in Eritrea, 1894-1935; Shobana SHANKAR: The Social Dimensions of Christian Leprosy Work among Muslims: American Missionaries and Young Patients in Colonial Northern Nigeria, 192040; John MANTON: Administering Leprosy Control in Ogoja Province, Nigeria, 1945-67: A Case Study in Government Mission Relations. 348pp, NETHERLANDS. RODOPI.

Now in paperback. Using personal stories collected from field visits and interviews, the author presents a history of the pioneering medical organisation, revealing the motivations and personal struggles of its volunteers. Illustrated with b/w and colour photographs. Index, notes, col photos, 272pp, CANADA. FIREFLY BOOKS.

Khat is a harmless natural stimulant or a lethal epidemic sweeping through the international drugs trade! Khat is a natural substance that, in the Middle East, is as ubiquitous as coffee is in the West. It is hugely popular in some African and Arab populations. But critics contend that it is a seriously addictive stimulant that damages the cardiovascular system. In a groundbreaking study, the authors go behind the veil of the drug, questioning its availability and its affect on its Red Sea producers. Interwoven with case studies from Djibouti to Rome, it explores contemporary issues relating to globalisation, ethnicity and culture. Index, bib, notes, 254pp, UK. BERG.

Although HIV/AIDS, TB and nutritional deficiencies pose major development problems on the continent, the challenges presented by malaria are of a different order, because the disease is widespread, persistent and grossly underestimated by the general population. The importance of malaria, along with HIV/AIDS and other diseases in the development agenda, is now recognised in Goal 6 of the Millennium Goals. This book provides the evidence required to design and implement malaria control strategies in Africa, and analyses the nexus of poverty and malaria with a focus on policies that can be implemented at various levels of society to fight the disease. Index, tables, charts, 1830pp, KENYA. NAIROBI UNIVERSITY PRESS.

Noting that competing for talent is recognised as an essential element of international competitiveness in the current world economy, this SAMP policy paper explores the central role is played by private and public sector recruitment agencies in shaping the international mobility of talented or skilled individuals. Argues that there has recently been an important and welcome policy shift away from the early reactive ad hoc policy responses to the development of a more comprehensive strategic response that seeks to manage the mobility of health professionals. 52pp, SOUTH AFRICA. IDASA.

2002 Paperback

An anthropological study of economy, human rights and medicine looking at the links between violence, power and ill health. The author links social inequality with disease and critiques current biomedical ethics issues holding back HIV/AIDS treatment for the poor. Foreword by Amartya Sen. Index, bib, notes, xxxvi, 402pp, USA. CALIFORNIA U P, 0520243269

Assesses the emergence of Africa's modern medical service and the contribution of African physicians to an understanding of African diseases and their treatment. Illustrated with b/w photographs. Index, bib, notes, apps, maps, 343pp, USA. FLORIDA U P, 0813014328

Uses political and socio-anthropological theory to examine the relationship between power, interest, and agency within population and family planning discourse across Africa, with particular emphasis on case studies from Tanzania. Index, bib, notes, 268pp, UK. PALGRAVE.

The role of the Colonial Medical Service - the organisation responsible for healthcare in British overseas territories - goes to the heart of the British Colonial project. This study is based on original sources and research into the work of doctors who served in East Africa. It shows the formulation of a distinct colonial identity based on factors of race, class, background, training and Colonial Service traditions, buttressed by professional skills and practice. Anna Crozier analyses all aspects of recruitment, qualifications, training as well as the vital personal factors that shaped the Service's character - religion, a sense of adventure, professional interest, ideas of imperial service, family traditions, professional ties, perceptions of service to humanity and the building up of a common service mentality among colonial medical staff. 272pp, UK. I B TAURIS.

Personal historical story of a practical pioneer primary health care project and its development in South Africa. It surveys developments from the 1930s, through the Apartheid years and into recent times, Refs, apps, index, xviii, 254pp, SOUTH AFRICA. WITWATERSRAND UNIVERSITY PRESS.

Argues that the 30th anniversary of the Alma Ata declaration on primary healthcare will bring a greater focus on health in Africa in 2008. Missing from this heightened focus is a synthesis of evidence and analysis by people within Africa of how to tackle inequalities in health. This regional equity analysis offers a comprehensive, yet accessible, resource presented through text, tables, figures, case studies, quotes and images. Evidence is drawn from published literature and formal government data, as well as from less commonly documented experience within the region from grey literature, interviews and testimonials, gathered through participatory processes. Index, tables, charts, col illus, 228pp, ZIMBABWE. WEAVER PRESS.

A study of the complex relationships between health, politics and capitalist globalisation. These essays by international activists and scholars reveal how plans by the World Bank and the WTO limit access to medical care and the privatisation of social services can have devastating consequences. Includes chapters on South Africa's cholera epidemic by Patrick Bond, the reglobalisation of Malaria by Timothy Holtz and S. Patrick Kachur, and the battle against global AIDS by Paul Davis and Meredith Fort. Index, notes, gloss, xvi, 237pp, USA. PLUTO PRESS, 0896087166

Fever, the Panama Canal, poetry and Roman emperors...all are linked by the mosquito, the pesky night-time bomber that buzzes its way into everyone's life. This small book explores how its 2,500 species have invaded not only bodies but culture too: every language acknowledges its fearsome reputation and pays a grudging respect to the tiny terror. B/w illus, 96pp, UK. NEW INTERNATIONALIST.

70 articles, specially commissioned for this volume and written by leading authorities in their field, provide an unusually wide ranging examination of the interface between warfare and human health and society. Includes case studies from Somalia and West Africa. Index, notes, annotated bib, app, index, 652pp, UK. ZED BOOKS, 1856499510